My New Favourite Tropes 🤓 2026 Reading Audit

112263 I think because he has multiple chances at the time travel.

A Little Devil in America, is a perfect example of media commentary. That's what the whole book is.

A curious beginning I put in fake dating because there's a little moment of fake dating between Veronica and Stoker. But what this technically does for me is it's historical, right? And they have a similar passion. They're both passionate about being naturalists. And it's plotheavy.

I'm putting all this and more into a book that plays with time because this is one where a character is on a reality show and they get to relive portions of their life and see what their life would look like.

I guess Babel fits in there pretty nicely

I feel like Bad Feminist is also that unless I'm mixing it up with another Roxang Gay. I think this one talks specifically about performances and other people's work.

I kind of think like Black Cake could fit for that if I'm remembering the plot of it properly.

The Butcher of the Forest by Premier Muhammad is a horror, very foresty.

Catherine House, Natural Beauty, The Will of the Many, and The Center are all about a character going into an unfamiliar environment, and it's either a place they can't leave, a place they feel they have to stay, a place they want to go to originally, but they're they're trapped in an environment of sorts.

Okay, Chen Gang Allstars definitely in my mind make sense.

I've read Alba Diaz, My Best Friend's Exorcism, Come Closer, Feast While You Can.

confessions that takes place at a school.

Dark Matter is his same life but a different version of it.

I feel like Daughter of the Moon Goddess had some types of competitions and training within it.

I left deep cuts down here. And this one definitely with the obsession about music and the music industry, it actually feels kind of like the author wrote a bunch of essays about stuff and then decided to just give it to our character.

I'm actually gonna steal the book that's right here, Eight Perfect Murders, and pop that over because what this category is fiction or non-fiction that talk about other fiction or non-fiction.

We have Elegy for the Undead which is about the undead. So like that's obviously the dead.

Emily Wild's Encyclopedia of Fairies is the quintessential book for this. It's historical. They're both scholarly. It's an adventure and a romance.

I'm going to pull up Empire of Shadows. This one also historical. They have a similar passion. It's plotheavy, adventury, and a romance.

I think maybe the employees by Olga Raven is like kind of a collective consciousness, but it's more about how the way the book is written as opposed to what's actually happening in the plot.

I loved The Compound, All This and More and Escape recently.

Exiles. Sure, the character is already an astronaut, but it is unfamiliar to go into this Mars setting and meet all of these robots.

we're also going to put female fantasy there because that's a character who is obsessed with a fictional character and the love story is not with them, but there are excerpts from the book within that book.

One that definitely does fit here is feast while you can. They are dealing with hate in their own community and then a demonic presence.

I guess like maybe Feather so black because it's about a changeling and they're kind of like she's trying to get back into contact with the person, her sister that she replaced.

I'm also seeing Fina and Fina up I need to move over into workplace dysfunction because that is the ultimate workplace dysfunction. Finding portals in your workplace that everyone there is telling you like, Oh, no, don't worry about it. And then your life is ultimately changed forever.

For your own good is another school setting where the teacher just wants to take people out.

my favorite contemporary romance of last year. Forget Me Not by Julie Sodto.

the first time I really encountered this and realized how much I loved it was with Girls Burn Brighter, which I put in Women's Love Prevails because their friendship is something that drives them on and they're constantly thinking about each other through their entire lives as they experience a lot of hardships.

another historical fantasy that I love is Half a Soul. This is a historical romance and there's a lot of plot and their minds are in alignment.

The Haunting of Velit is going to stay here because it's just that time has stopped in this one little neighborhood.

Headshot is the obsession with boxing.

Ooh, House of Hunger. That's a perfect one that isn't a school environment. She is in a manor and being used by people who are into bloodletting.

House of Leaves is like someone reading a story of a story.

How to Become the Dark Lord is like a video game. It's resetting the same day over and over again.

the husbands, I would move over to resetting reality because every time she gets a new husband, she gets a another try at life, another try at a different partner.

I was a teenage slasher. Like that character is just living a happy high school summer and then suddenly he starts killing people.

if we were villains and the secret history, these have never fit anywhere because I don't have a dark academia section because I don't love enough books that are just blanket dark academia, but these are an isolated environment kind of books.

Immaculate Conception is one that I think makes sense in that category. That's a hard book to even pitch, but it's not a romance.

In My Dreams I Hold a Knife is the perfect example of a bunch of characters separating and then they have to come back together to solve a mystery.

I think I could put it into informative memoir because that's one where you're reading where Jane Austin got inspiration, but you also are reading the author's experience as a rare book dealer and information about all these women from history.

So even Julie Chan would fit into this where the character has no malicious intent going into a situation, but they just have to kind of roll with what has been presented to them.

Kindred is just time travel.

I reddownloaded the Lion Women of Tron. This is a great example of these young girls, separating, coming back together, and their dynamics shifting throughout the years.

another book similar is Love of My Afterlife. This is another one where we have a character who gets to upon death go back and like accomplish a goal and see what life could have been.

My Heart is a Chainsaw I kind of think fits in the Obsession one, but even more so at this point it looks great in media commentary because she's obsessed with horror films.

I've read Alba Diaz, My Best Friend's Exorcism, Come Closer, Feast While You Can.

Catherine House, Natural Beauty, The Will of the Many, and The Center are all about a character going into an unfamiliar environment, and it's either a place they can't leave, a place they feel they have to stay, a place they want to go to originally, but they're they're trapped in an environment of sorts.

Neverworld Wake would be moved over because it's about reliving the same day over and over again until you solve the mystery.

Notes on Infinity is about obsession with creating immortality.

and then also One Day Everyone Will Have Always Been Against This by Omar Alakad.

Una Out of Order. See, it is her life, but she's just living it one year at a time, but in the wrong order.

I would even say the ornithologist field guide to love because it's a hyperfixation on a competition where you have to find this rare bird.

The Paul Baris Club is a man writing a memoir and somebody annotating it.

And then Parable of the Sewer, like that character is creating their own religion and therefore book I feel like we're reading the book.

Passing by Nella Larson just came to mind. Oh, yeah. There it is. Okay, that's another good example of these women and their dynamic shifting over time.

People we meet on vacation. That would also be a good one because they hang out every summer for a trip.

perfect victims by Muhammad Al Kurd

Possession is certainly unfamiliar.

Even the Martian in Project Hal Mary, I think, could be workplace dysfunction because like they're doing a job and even if it's not dysfunctional amongst the people, the situation is.

Several people are typing this one. A person gets stuck into their office chatbot.

like in sign here where we're following someone in hell who has to get people to sign up or sign their life away.

A sky full of elephants is about like a huge selection of the population all dying on the same day and how that affects the people remaining.

tender as the flesh, that's a good example.

Catherine House, Natural Beauty, The Will of the Many, and The Center are all about a character going into an unfamiliar environment, and it's either a place they can't leave, a place they feel they have to stay, a place they want to go to originally, but they're they're trapped in an environment of sorts.

the compound I feel like fits in here. I love how we don't even get a good idea of what the world looks like, but we know it's not in a great place.

I've only read a couple clone books that I've loved like The Echo Wife and The Murders of Molly Southborn

I also would put the Everlasting by Alex E. Harrow in this category because it fits into a couple different categories actually.

The sports ones we talked about earlier, Headshot and The Favorites. Yes, they are definitely about obsession with sports, but they're also sports books that do have competitions within the story lines.

So we talked about the har and the har like the woman's husband dies and then she comes across this creaturous thing like that is that's unfamiliar.

Even the Martian in Project Hal Mary, I think, could be workplace dysfunction because like they're doing a job and even if it's not dysfunctional amongst the people, the situation is.

I'm going to put the measure in there. This is about death in the way that like you get a little string that tells you how long you're going to live and from there you have to make decisions leading up to your death, how impending death is for you.

Also, in informative memoirs, I would put this little trio of books. The message by Tanahasi Coats

The Midnight Library, that's one of the first ones I ever really read where I realized I love this thing.

I've only read a couple clone books that I've loved like The Echo Wife and The Murders of Molly Southborn

Also from last year, one of my favorite reads was The Raven Scholar. This one has to do with competing and the training to compete and someone being in charge of their clan and then that clan being in charge of like everyone.

the reformatory like this one I love it because it has great commentary and it has a historical context where a child is taken into a reformatory and there is a goal technically for the people putting it on they're trying to reil rehabilitate him make him a better person and also enact like a punishment upon this child who did nothing wrong.

if we were villains and the secret history, these have never fit anywhere because I don't have a dark academia section because I don't love enough books that are just blanket dark academia, but these are an isolated environment kind of books.

The Seven and a Half Deaths of Evelyn Hardcastle is experiencing the same day over and over again from different perspectives.

The Seven-Year Slip is one where it's just two characters who are in a different timeline, and every time they go into an apartment, they see each other, but they can only see each other like in this one apartment.

I'm also going to put the 13th tale in this moment. I can't remember a ton of the plot of this one for some reason, but I remember it's very bookish.

The Wedding People is about a woman who's thinking about ending her life.

The Will of the Many. A character has to go into a school and pretend to be someone.

I loved Till Summer Do Us Part, which has to do with a woman hiring this man to make her co-workers think that she is in a relationship, but it's actually like a getaway where they have to pretend they're in a bad relationship and their relationship's going to be fixed.

To be taught a fortunate is one that I loved recently

Vampires of El Norte, perfect example of like a romance horror that fits into that trope because the characters are separated for a large amount of their lives, maybe not even knowing the other one is still around or still loves them and whatnot.

Is walking practice not about an alien who is obsessed with consuming humans? Like that's really all they think about.

I guess Bunny. Yeah, that's more of a realistic like they're just in a school environment, but it is the MFA program naturally very isolating, even if the magical portion of it is happening outside of that.

We Ride Upon Sticks is a great example.

haunted house category because we used to live here. House of leaves and like kind of brat fit into that.

Wild Dark Shore is also like a future where we know things are not in a great place, but it's not super clear what's happening in the world.

and like The Wild Ones, I see it. I just don't think that it's a core favorite of mine.

I would also say the Wonder State fits well for this. we have characters who in their childhood were friends and then like 15 years later they're coming back together to figure out if these weird houses that they remember are reality or what they were really experiencing when they were younger.

I would say female fantasy and yellowface also have a media commentary, but it's more about commentary about the book industry, the writing industry, and like being a reader.